


When the Music Stopped

by queenofthorns



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Film Noir, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-01
Updated: 2016-12-12
Packaged: 2018-09-03 14:13:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,160
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8716987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenofthorns/pseuds/queenofthorns
Summary: It looks like Brienne Tarth will have to close down the Evenstar Detective Agency. Her father's in the hospital, the bank's calling in its loans, and her last job ended so badly that no one will hire her for another one. No one except playboy Jaime Lannister, who's desperate to prove that his brother didn't kill his nephew. Will this odd couple beat the odds and find a killer before an innocent man pays the price?





	1. Chapter 1

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Even in war, there are rules. Aerys Targaryen broke every one of them, and never paid for it until the night I slit his throat.

__

I should have done it sooner, the minute I realized what he was. But my brothers in the King’s Guard would have stopped me. They were all honorable men, you see. Officers and gentlemen, the lot of them, who obeyed their orders. All except me, of course.

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Why did I join the Guard? 

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Because I wanted to hurt my father as much as he’d hurt me. Because I was a young idiot who wanted to be a hero. Because I thought the war would be an glorious adventure, the way it was in the films Tyrion was barely old enoughto see. 

__

I told myself all those lies and a hundred more besides. The truth is that there was only one reason: I joined the King’s Guard for love.

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The summer Cersei and I were seventeen, my father arranged a marriage for her with Robert Baratheon. He called the match “an advantageous alliance between our two houses.” I called it a broken heart, the end of my life. I was seventeen, remember? 

__

I begged Cersei to run away with me, to Essos, or even to Asshai, and she told me not to be an idiot. I thought about going down on bended knee to my father, begging him to reconsider, but the truth was that once Tywin Lannister had decided something concerning his family, he was as immovable as Casterly Rock. Rumor was that my mother had challenged him on occasion and he’d conceded, but she’d been dead for a decade at that point. And she would hardly have approved of my feelings for Cersei.

__

The parties, the dinners, the toasts to the happy couple and the happy merger of Baratheon and Lannister holdings … they were like white-hot needles under my skin. When I saw Robert’s hands at Cersei’s waist as they danced, I imagined those thick fingers with their wiry black hair on her creamy skin, exploring the secret places of her body, and I wanted to kill him. It wasn’t really Robert; I'd have considered murdering Blessed Baelor himself if he’d been Cersei's bridegroom.

__

I picked a fight with Robert’s friend Ned Stark at the wedding, just so I could hit someone. This earned me my father’s cold fury, and immediate banishment from the reception. Yes, that's right, at my sister's wedding, I was sent to my room without my supper. 

__

There _was_ whiskey, though, so I sprawled on my bed and drank. It was the same bed where Cersei and I had slept wrapped in each other’s arms when we were babies, and played when we were children. When our mock wrestling had turned into fucking, that was in my bed too. 

__

I sulked, and I drank, and then I sulked some more, and drank again. I was so blind with self-pity and alcohol that when Cersei slipped into bed with me later that night, and unbuttoned my trousers and slid my shirt over my head, I thought she was only a dream conjured up out of my need. 

__

I woke with the sun the next morning, because little men were doing a dance with clogs and chisels on the inside of my head, and all I could think of was that Cersei would never be mine, and that without her my life had no meaning. Again, I was seventeen. And remarkably stupid. 

__

Somehow, I got my aching head and uncooperative limbs down to the recruiting office in Sept Square, and joined up to go fight against Valyria, in what the noble Lords of the Estates-General called The Just War, though Just-in-Case-War might have been closer to the truth. Just in case the Commons got restless. Just in case anyone ever called for true popular government … 

__

I’d never seen my father so angry as he was when he found out, but he couldn’t get me out of it. It wouldn’t have looked good to the Commons, you see, if Tywin Lannister pulled strings to keep his son safe in the war he'd been so keen to start. He did get his way in one thing: they made me an officer, and assigned me to General Targaryen's staff.

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The rest, as they say, is history.

__


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brienne has run out of options to keep her father's detective agency open, when suddenly, an unexpected savior appears. The trouble is, she might punch him in the nose before she ever gets a chance to hear his story.

It was no use. The numbers in the ledger refused to let Brienne make this month's rent on the office or the cramped apartment upstairs. She tried adding up the column of figures again, but the truth was staring her in the face, and she was too honest to blink first: if something didn't turn up within the next two days, she'd be forced to close down the agency.

The phone hadn't rung in a week; either the people of King's Landing had given up their favorite pastimes of adultery and insurance fraud, the bread-and-butter of every PI's caseload, or else they too had caught the carrion whiff of failure that clung to the Evenstar Agency and sought help elsewhere. Even if her father made it out of the hospital, the only things waiting for him would be his daughter and disgrace.

Disgrace was nothing new to Brienne. Its bitter taste had been in her mouth for months, like weak coffee left too long on the stove to stew, ever since the disaster of her first job on her own. Nothing had gone right since the Baratheon case had gone so spectacularly wrong.

A simple bodyguard assignment had ended with Renly Baratheon bleeding out in her arms. No one except her father had believed Brienne's story about a man in a black overcoat coming out of the shadows of Sowbelly Row to shoot Renly. The police had never found the murder weapon, which was the only reason Brienne had escaped arrest for the crime; privately, Brienne was certain that Stannis Baratheon was behind his younger brother's untimely demise, but she had no evidence to prove his guilt.

Lack of evidence hadn't stopped the newspapers from speculating that Brienne had killed Renly herself, in a fit of jealousy that handsome Renly had decided to marry Margaery Tyrell. For a few weeks, they'd even stationed photographers outside the agency, but they'd eventually drifted off in search of meatier prey. The damage was already done: clients had fallen away like dry leaves in autumn, afraid of the publicity, or unwilling to entrust themselves to the hands of anyone as inept as Brienne.

The bad publicity, the loss of income, and, most of all, his distress on Brienne's behalf had driven Selwyn Tarth into a heart attack three weeks ago. Brienne blamed the press, and Stannis, and herself most of all.

"Someday," Brienne said to herself. Someday she would find evidence to convict Stannis Baratheon for the murder of his younger brother. She only hoped that day would come while her father still lived, but proof was a thousand times harder to come by than suspicion, and she had no time to follow the few leads she had.

 _Unless you're evicted_ , she thought. _Then you'll have all the time in the world._ With a heartfelt sigh, she picked up her pen, which squirted a puddle of navy-blue ink onto the ledger, blotting the figures she'd painstakingly filled out.

"Damn it!" Brienne swore. "Damn it all to seven hells!"

"I know exactly how you feel," a drawling voice said from the doorway.

An errant ray of sunlight slanted through the blinds and set the dust-motes to dancing, so Brienne's dazzled eyes caught a vague impression of gold and white, like the stained-glass angels high up in the windows of the Great Sept.

As her eyes cleared and her visitor approached her desk, Brienne revised her first impression. This angel had fallen from the heavens a long time ago; he looked like he'd been sampling a rich banquet of sins ever since. He was hatless, and his hair, bright as new-minted gold, stuck out of his head at odd, spiky angles. His eyes were red-rimmed and dark-shadowed; it was clear that he hadn't seen a razor, a bath, or a change of clothing for at least a couple of days. His collar was open; he wore no tie and a malodorous, oily smear graced the right sleeve of his white suit.

 _Not a suit. A uniform._ And not just a uniform. A King's Guard uniform, with a row of ribbons on his chest, under a golden crown insignia. All at once, she knew exactly who he was, though it had been twenty years since his face had been on the front page of every newspaper and magazine in Westeros.

Back then, Tywin Lannister's older son had been little more than a boy, and the black-and-white newsreels hadn't done justice to the rich gold of his hair or the poison green of his eyes. But his sharp cheekbones and the arrogant curl of his upper lip hadn't changed in two decades.

Brienne had still been in school then, and Jaime Lannister's acquittal had been her first experience of the deep, intractable injustice of the world, though it would not be her last.

"It's not fair. He killed his general," Brienne had insisted. "It's not fair that he's still in the army." Most of the King's Landing newspapers - at least the ones not owned by Lannister interests - had agreed with her on that point.

"That does seem unusual," Selwyn Tarth, a veteran himself, had agreed. "If it's any consolation, back in my day the Wall was where you died of cold and boredom."

Her father's words nothwithstanding, they all knew that if the man who killed Aerys Targaryen had been born in Flea Bottom, his sentence would have been execution, not exile; she was surprised at how much that still rankled.

Brienne's face must have reflected her thoughts, because Jaime Lannister's mouth twisted into an ugly parody of a smile. "I see you know who I am," he said.

She nodded. What business could Jaime Lannister possibly have with her father? Even at the best of times, Evenstar's caseload was ninety-eight percent suspicious spouses, or hand-me-down fraud investigations that Selwyn's contacts in the financial industry threw their way. Their only high-profile case had ended in their client's death. Not exactly a confidence-builder. What _was_ Lannister doing here?

"You must be what they call the strong, silent type," he said.

Brienne was jolted out of her thoughts. "Pardon me?"

"I've never done this before, but I think this is where you offer me a seat. And then you tell your boss you have a new client?" From his trouser pocket, Lannister pulled a sheet of paper filled with crossed out addresses, and read from it. "Selwyn Tarth, Evenstar Agency, 52 Eel Alley, Suite 4." He looked around, evidently unimpressed. "I need to see him."

"Oh," Brienne said distractedly. "I mean ... please sit down." She reminded herself firmly that notorious as Lannister was, he was just another potential client. Notwithstanding his blinding gloss of lifelong privilege, she would treat him just as she'd treat anyone else. She unscrewed the cap of her pen and fished her notebook out from under the ledger. "Mr. Tarth isn't here at the moment, but I can take down the particulars of your case. I'm Brienne. Brienne Tarth."

Lannister's elegantly marked eyebrows shot up. "I've heard of you," he said, his voice dropping to a lower register, as though he were quoting something. "Scorned lover becomes slayer... Baratheon brother betrayed by bodyguard. That was you, wasn't it?"

Brienne pressed down so hard on the pen that the nib broke and skittered across her notebook. Blood rushed up into her cheeks; she knew her face was blotchy, scarlet clashing hideously with the orange-brown of her freckles. As soon as she was sure her voice wouldn't crack, she'd tell Lannister what he could do with his insinuations and insults. And then she'd tell him calmly to leave her office and never come back because she'd never work for a man like him.

Lannister must have mistaken Brienne's angry silence for shame. "Don't worry," he said. "I don't actually believe it. Most of what the papers said about me wasn't true either. And anyone who ever met Renly knew he didn't care for women _that_ way."

Curiosity temporarily triumphed over fury. "What do you mean?"

"His lovers were men."

Brienne frowned in disbelief.

"You didn't know? Truly?"

She shook her head. She had never suspected but now that Lannister had said it, she could see the pattern; at last their presence in Sowbelly Row that fateful night made sense. So did Renly's strenuous resistance to the idea of Brienne's accompanying him to the "gentleman's club." _Poor Renly_ , she thought. Always having to hide who he really was, afraid of being arrested for his choice of whom to love, afraid of bringing disrepute to his family. If she had known... 

"That doesn't speak well for your sleuthing talents," Lannister said. "Small wonder Renly died with you guarding him."

Brienne leaped up, sending her chair crashing back, putting another crack into the hideous laminated panels behind her. "Mr. Lannister," she said, with her fists clenched tight at her sides to stop her from putting one of them smack in the middle of his smug, gorgeous face. "I must ask you to leave. There are a dozen other agencies that may prove more to your satisfaction."

Some vestigial remnant of courtesy made Lannister stand when Brienne did, so she had the petty but intensely satisfying realization that she was an inch taller. More if she wore heels, though she rarely did. She'd buy the highest ones she could walk in, she decided, just for the pleasure of looking down at him. That was before she remembered she hadn't any money, and in any case, she wouldn't be seeing Lannister ever again.

Lannister looked away. His next words seemed to surprise him as much as they did her. "I'm sorry," he said softly.

"Pardon me?" Brienne asked, though she had heard him perfectly well.  
  
"I apologize," he repeated. "What I said was unforgivable, though I hope you will forgive me." He met her eyes at last. "You see, I need your help." From his breast-pocket, he pulled a wad of crisp 500-dragon bills held together with a golden clip, and placed it on the table in front of her. "And I'm willing to pay whatever you want for it."

Nothing would have been more satisfying than refusing Lannister's apology; but the ink-blotted numbers in her ledger, his cash on the table, and the smell of desperation that wafted off him like cheap perfume were three powerful arguments for giving the man another chance. Brienne couldn't afford the pleasure of righteous indignation; right now, she needed Lannister as much as he allegedly needed her.

She nodded, and pulled her chair back towards her desk. "Sit down please, Mr. Lannister," she said. "I can't promise you anything until I've heard what this is all about."

"Thank you," he said, seating himself with the same unconscious grace that had irritated Brienne from the moment she first saw him.

 _You don't have to like him_ , she reminded herself. _You just have to listen to him. You can always say no to whatever it is he wants._

"This isn't an excuse for my behavior," Lannister went on. "But I -- I'm not used to asking for help."

"That was painfully obvious, Mr. Lannister."

Brienne could have bitten her tongue at how thoroughly she had just ignored her own sensible advice. But Lannister surprised her again, flashing her a grin that was equal parts amusement and contrition. "I deserved that," he said. "And ... It's ... Major Lannister, actually."

Quite against her will, she found herself smiling back. "Now, Mr. Lannister," she said, refusing to bend quite that far. "How in particular can I help you?" She attached a new nib to her pen without taking her eyes from him; she didn't want to miss any clues that his expressive face might provide.

Lannister's smile vanished. "It's my brother Tyrion," he said. "He's been arrested for murder."

"Whose murder?" Brienne asked coolly, as though she were accustomed to dealing with murders in high society on a frequent basis.

"You haven't seen the papers?"

Brienne had spent the weekend in the hushed urgency of the Intensive Care Unit of King's Landing's Central Hospital. If there had been any gossip amongst the staff about a murder involving Lannisters, she wouldn't have heard it, focused as she was on the beeps and hisses that meant her father was still breathing. Selwyn Tarth's condition was nothing she cared to share with Jaime Lannister, so she said only "I was away."

"On Saturday evening, my ... my sister's son, Joffrey Baratheon, was killed at a party to celebrate his engagement to the Tyrell girl."

"Margaery Tyrell?" Brienne raised her head. She hadn't known Renly's ex had found another fiance so quickly. Uncle and nephew had both died shortly after being engaged to her; there _had_ to be a connection.

"The same." He snorted. "Losing one betrothed was tragic; a second veers towards farce, don't you think?" 

His light tone and careless words nearly fooled Brienne, until she looked at his lap, where his fists were clenched so tight that his knuckles showed white against his tanned skin. Brienne felt a pang of reluctant sympathy; it couldn't be easy to have your brother accused of the death of your nephew.

"Go on," Brienne said. "Your brother was arrested for the murder?"

"Yes. They handcuffed Tyrion while the medics were still working on Joffrey." He looked at a point over Brienne's shoulder, as though he could see the whole grim scene unfolding all over again on the imitation wood-panelling of the wall. "I should have stopped them then, but I didn't. I didn't even try. I should have tried."  
  


Something puzzled Brienne. Everyone knew the Lannisters owned cops, judges, not to mention an army of lawyers, and no doubt well-equipped investigators as well. Even though it might mean a fond farewell to the large pile of cash on her desk, she had to ask.

"Major Lannister, I don't understand. It's not that I don't wish to take your case, but ... with your family's resources -- That is to say ... why have you come _here_? Surely the police would help you. Or the judges who issued the warrant?"

He ran a hand through his hair, making the spikes even spikier. "Gods! I've been to all of them. The cops, the judges, every private eye in this city. They all slammed their doors shut as soon as they saw me coming. None of them will help Tyrion." He swallowed hard. "You're my last hope."

"But why?" Brienne asked. "Who would arrest and charge a Lannister? That's a sure ticket to the unemployment line."

Lannister looked like she'd sucker-punched him in the gut.

"Not if another Lannister ordered them to," he said.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I realized as I was writing this chapter that, of course, Jaime is the obligatory femme fatale (homme fatale, I guess!) of noir, ready to lead our detective with a troubled past very badly astray.

**Author's Note:**

> A note about the setting - let’s imagine that, like all the best noir, this story takes place in something like the late 1940s (though not our world!) So gentlemen wear hats, and ladies wear gloves and complicated undergarments, there are internal combustion engines, machine guns, cigarettes, whiskey, coffee, swing bands, and some antibiotics. But there aren't any computers, cell phones, televisions, or other assorted mod cons.  
> Also, just in case you are mildly allergic to first-person narrative fanfic by major characters, as I am - most of this won't be first person. It's just that a noir story needs a little bit of that, don't you think?


End file.
